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  • Adrian_Thompson

    June 3, 2009 2:54 p.m. Adrian_Thompson Reader

    Any argument about the merits of a 10 -15 - 20 - 25 - 30 year old car Vs a new hybrid or plug in hybrid is meaningless. Outside the 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001% of the population that likes to mess with cars and considers the $200x challenge the holy grail of motorsport then old cars are a) unreliable b) expensive to get fixed c) not safe d) not desirable. It's hard to argue with that for most people.

    Heck, having spent a large part of my youth stitching two totaled cars together to build one, building race cars, spending lunch hours porting cylinder heads, building exhausts and rebuilding engines etc when the boss wasn't looking, traipsing around the country autocrossing etc etc you know, normal GRM reader behavior I now find myself calling the dealer to see what an oil change will cost, no E36 M3. To 'most' people cars are utility devices that also need to meet pamper to their perceived needs and image. Based on that GM will sell all the Volts they can build, at least for the first year until the new hotness comes along from some one else.

    Also just because someone's total family annual income is close to the price of a Volt means squat. If cars had to conform to that then BMW, Merc, Porsche, Lincoln, Caddy etc etc would never sell a thing and there would be no cheap E30's for people to plat with 20 years down the line.

    GRM isn't the average buying public.

  • poopshovel

    June 3, 2009 2:57 p.m. poopshovel SuperDork

    Why is this even an issue???

    Because, although he's never run a berkeleying business or written a damned payroll check, King Obama has proclaimed himself president, CEO, and Chief Designer at GM, and thee Obama says we all need to drive dirt/wind/magic powered cars. COMPLY!

    (just being sarcastic...mostly.)

  • MitchellC

    June 3, 2009 3:01 p.m. MitchellC HalfDork

    I think that the Volt is great for this year's "apologetic" opulence. At 10,000 units it's about as rare as a modern talian supercar, and it gets you the cutting edge of electric motoring instead of a "cheap" European luxury car. Good on GM for keeping on with it; they need some innovation.

  • foxtrapper

    June 3, 2009 7:23 p.m. foxtrapper SuperDork

    Kramer wrote:

    foxtrapper wrote:

    The Volt is a joke.

    40 mile range on batteries, then it kicks in the gas motor that can barely get it up to highway speeds.

    I don't think you understand how the Volt works. The gas motor will never power the wheels, no matter how low the battery charge gets. Electric motors always power the car, and they're not de-powered as the battery charge lessens.

    Let me edit my reply, because it was pointlessly snarky.

    At roughly 40 miles the batteries are so low the little gas engine kicks in to try to keep them from going totally flat. The gasoline engine generator is so small that it doesn't produce the watts to keep the car moving at highway speed and recharge the batteries. So you end up slowing down to a chugging pace.

    I work with a bunch of eco-weenies, and none of them even like the Volt. They all find it absurdly useless. Only one person I know of thinks it might be almost usable by him, and that's only because he lives in the city and has never owned a car in his life.

    If it had better range, at least enough to make it possible to commute to work, that might do. Equally if it had enough engine to keep it going down the road when the batteries discharged, that might do as well. It misses on both points.

  • ignorant

    June 3, 2009 7:28 p.m. ignorant PowerDork

    foxtrapper wrote:

    The thing's an absolute joke.

    I agree

  • June 3, 2009 7:56 p.m. blizazer New Reader

    foxtrapper wrote:

    Kramer wrote:

    foxtrapper wrote:

    The Volt is a joke.

    40 mile range on batteries, then it kicks in the gas motor that can barely get it up to highway speeds.

    I don't think you understand how the Volt works. The gas motor will never power the wheels, no matter how low the battery charge gets. Electric motors always power the car, and they're not de-powered as the battery charge lessens.

    At 40 miles the batteries are so low the gas engine has kicked in to try to keep them from going totally flat. It's not enough to charge them while the motors are sucking electricity down. So you chug along blocking traffic while the engine tries to charge things.

    Sounds about like what I already described, eh?

    The thing's an absolute joke.

    Why would you want to charge it off pricey gas?

    The whole point is to plug it in and use electricity / displace petroleum. Right?

    Or am I missing the point?

  • 924guy

    June 3, 2009 8:06 p.m. 924guy HalfDork

    IMO not allot to debate here, the car will be way over priced and incapable of meeting the demands of what most people need cars to do. sounds like a flop to me, and it hasnt even hit the showroom yet... If this is thier new "good" idea, id hate to see what the bad ideas were...

  • Tom_Spangler

    June 3, 2009 8:57 p.m. Tom_Spangler New Reader

    foxtrapper wrote:

    At roughly 40 miles the batteries are so low the little gas engine kicks in to try to keep them from going totally flat. The gasoline engine generator is so small that it doesn't produce the watts to keep the car moving at highway speed and recharge the batteries. So you end up slowing down to a chugging pace.

    I've been following the press coverage of this car fairly closely, and I haven't heard this. It sounds like a deal-killer to me. Do you have a source?

  • TJ

    June 3, 2009 9:29 p.m. TJ Reader

    924guy wrote:

    If this is thier new "good" idea, id hate to see what the bad ideas were...

    We've seen a lot of them already....the Aztek comes to mind.

  • TJ

    June 3, 2009 9:32 p.m. TJ Reader

    John Brown wrote:

    $40,000 for a Cruze?

    Obamaco wants there money back quick!

    It's our money, and I don't think Obama really cares if he(we) ever get it back.

  • Toyman01

    June 3, 2009 9:33 p.m. Toyman01 Reader

    The economics just don't add up. Even if I could replace my three work vans with electrics, the numbers just don't work. I would have to spend 120k on an inadequate car to save 15k per year in fuel costs. That's an 8 year re-coop replacing a fleet that averages 13mpg. That doesn't include the cost of charging. So about the time you broke even, it would be time to replace them. If I can't make the numbers add up replacing a full size van, how can the numbers work replacing a car that gets 25-30mpg. That doesn't even get into the fact that the cars aren't as capable as a Yugo.

    The people buying these will be the same self righteous ones that bought the Prius. It will make them feel good about themselves. They can pat themselves on the back because they are saving the planet.

  • Hal

    June 3, 2009 9:34 p.m. Hal HalfDork

    The wife and I have "bought new" for the last 40 years. The only time we have ever paid more than 20K was for the the wifes current car. A 2000 Buick LeSabre, and we only paid 22K for that. We could afford a 40K car but will never do it.

    Now that we are retired what we could use is an all electric plug-in(no hybrid) about the size of a Ford Ka or Fiat 500. If it only had a 40 mile range that would be fine since that would last us for 2 weeks. We would also want a Ford Focus size vehicle with a DSG type trans for longer trips. According to rumor that one is coming in a year or so.

  • skierd

    June 4, 2009 12:35 a.m. skierd Dork

    I stopped being interested in the Volt (and any other GM car) when it became Government Motors.

  • John Brown

    June 4, 2009 6:50 a.m. John Brown MegaDork

    I was MORE interested in it since I became a 1/138,000,000 owner of the company.

    The reasont he EV1 was not viable was battery technology in GMs own words. So why not start with the Cruze platform, add the EV1 engineered materials and adapt to the newer power cells?

  • speedblind

    June 4, 2009 8:10 a.m. speedblind Reader

    I just saw Who Killed the Electric Car. Every single one of those whiners better pony up! They spent 2 hours vilifying GM for taking their cars away and now they have a chance to get a better one.

  • foxtrapper

    June 4, 2009 8:45 a.m. foxtrapper SuperDork

    Pfft! In no way is the Volt a better car than the EV1.

  • jgp1843

    June 4, 2009 8:56 a.m. jgp1843 HalfDork

    And where does this "clean" electricity come from? Yep, coal or natural gas-fired power plants. And how much more will the distribution system have to handle if a significant number of plug-ins operate in, say southern California? Can you say "brown-out" or "power interruption"? No power source is free or clean unless you are using wind, solar or tide generation, and while the technology is improving inthose areas, any large use of plug-in electrics will rely on power generated by today's technology powerplants.

    Oh, right, we'll just build the plants somewhere out in the desert, or on the reservations where we don't have to look at them - then we can thhink that we're saving the environment. Unless maybe we wake up and authorize new nuclear plants.

    I actually like the idea of electric vehicles, particularly for city use, but hybrids are the way to do it for the foreseeable future. The volt's idea of using a small gas engine to generate electridity to power the car is a good idea (not new, though - the original Dr. Porsche was designing cars with a power system similar in concept almost 100 years ago, with all-wheel-drive by hub motors - but adding the plug-in feature only works if you have the power generating and distributing system in place to utilize it.

  • neon4891

    June 4, 2009 9:12 a.m. neon4891 UltraDork

    Short answer, yes. I'm not saying it is a wise use money, but people (eco weanies and the "Jonses") wll need to have them.

    I'd rather have a TDI on Veg oil

  • alfadriver

    June 4, 2009 9:44 a.m. alfadriver HalfDork

    foxtrapper wrote:

    Pfft! In no way is the Volt a better car than the EV1.

    Well, besides the 4 seats.

    And the longer overall range.

    And the better batteries.

    And the shorter recharging time

    And the less alienating looks.

    Yea, the volt is no better.

  • aircooled

    June 4, 2009 10:17 a.m. aircooled SuperDork

    And likely a fair amount cheaper.

    They said (in the movie) they had a 4000 person waiting list for the EV-1, I guess we will see if they pony up.

  • aircooled

    June 4, 2009 1:06 p.m. aircooled SuperDork

    TJ wrote:

    John Brown wrote:

    $40,000 for a Cruze?

    Obamaco wants there money back quick!

    It's our money, and I don't think Obama really cares if he(we) ever get it back.

    For those who like calling it ObomaCo, you might want to take note of this:

    Former Vice President Dick Cheney says that former President George W. Bush did not want to be the one who “pulled the plug” on General Motors and instead decided to pass on the issue to President Barack Obama.

    “I thought that, eventually, the right outcome was going to be bankruptcy,” Cheney said of the company during the second part of interview with Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren that aired Tuesday night.

    “[GM] had to go through such a dramatic restructuring to have any chance of survival that they had to be able to renegotiate labor contracts and so forth,” he said. “And the president decided that he did not want to be the one who pulled the plug just before he left office.”

    Cheney said that rather than acting on GM, the Bush administration “put together a package that tided GM over until the new administration had a chance to look at it.”

    http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/23283.html

    So should it be BushCo? Well probably not, all the money he put into it is probably long gone...

  • speedblind

    June 4, 2009 2:01 p.m. speedblind Reader

    aircooled wrote:

    And likely a fair amount cheaper.

    They said (in the movie) they had a 4000 person waiting list for the EV-1, I guess we will see if they pony up.

    I think that was for leases. The actual cars cost north of 100K. GM leased them at a loss to appease CARB.

  • Adrian_Thompson

    June 4, 2009 2:08 p.m. Adrian_Thompson Reader

    Toyman01 wrote:

    The economics just don't add up. Even if I could replace my three work vans with electrics, the numbers just don't work. I would have to spend 120k on an inadequate car to save 15k per year in fuel costs. That's an 8 year re-coop replacing a fleet that averages 13mpg. That doesn't include the cost of charging. So about the time you broke even, it would be time to replace them. If I can't make the numbers add up replacing a full size van, how can the numbers work replacing a car that gets 25-30mpg. That doesn't even get into the fact that the cars aren't as capable as a Yugo.

    It doesn't have to make sense. If automotive buying decision had to make sense no one would ever buy anything other than a base Focus or a base F150, they would then keep that vehicle for 10 years. Car purchsing is 99% emotion and 1% logic. Everyone on this forum proves that. No one NEEDS a toy car, we want them
    Toyman01 wrote: The people buying these will be the same self righteous ones that bought the Prius. It will make them feel good about themselves. They can pat themselves on the back because they are saving the planet.

    Precisly you've just proved it your self. And don't forget those same irrational people who buy Prius's (Priii??) are called the general public and they are the same people who also buy Miata's, Mustangs, etc etc for GRM readers to buy used 10 years down the line.

  • Adrian_Thompson

    June 4, 2009 2:18 p.m. Adrian_Thompson Reader

    foxtrapper wrote:

    Kramer wrote:

    foxtrapper wrote:

    The Volt is a joke.

    40 mile range on batteries, then it kicks in the gas motor that can barely get it up to highway speeds.

    I don't think you understand how the Volt works. The gas motor will never power the wheels, no matter how low the battery charge gets. Electric motors always power the car, and they're not de-powered as the battery charge lessens.

    Let me edit my reply, because it was pointlessly snarky.

    At roughly 40 miles the batteries are so low the little gas engine kicks in to try to keep them from going totally flat. The gasoline engine generator is so small that it doesn't produce the watts to keep the car moving at highway speed and recharge the batteries. So you end up slowing down to a chugging pace.

    30 seconds with Google indicates that the average commute in the US is 16 miles or 26 mins each way. To me that says that the car will have plenty of juice to get too AND from work on batteries alone. Second, the the average speed is low enough that even if the generator does need to run, the vehicle won't have to slow down to compensate.

  • John Brown

    June 4, 2009 2:38 p.m. John Brown MegaDork

    If they made this a seven passenger commuter vehicle we could use it for $40,000.00 for carpool duty.

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